


Area Ineffable

by estullefavric



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Fluff and Humor, M/M, Pre-Relationship, a bit ooc but i blame that on crowley understanding the power of memes, area51raid!AU, aziraphale is so done, crowley is into shitposting maybe a little too much, dead memes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 13:21:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20243539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estullefavric/pseuds/estullefavric
Summary: Crowley seems to have a little too much fun with the power of the Internet, but Aziraphale doesn't have the heart to stop him. How could he when the demon seems so genuinely happy?Shitposting ensues.





	Area Ineffable

While you could say Aziraphale is not exactly keen on technology, there are some human inventions he admires. He welcomed refrigerators with open hands, the nifty machines allowing him to enjoy more fresh food without the need to dropping by the French revolution just to get some crêpes. While nothing rivals the smell and feel of paperback books and the satisfaction of owning some of the rarest editions the world has ever seen, obtaining information through the Internet (albeit Crowley still made fun of him typing “google” into the search bar) is much quicker, even if the websites are not always trustworthy and the demon sometimes has to come into the bookshop just to whine over his ancient computer and delete weird viruses which always somehow manage to crawl their way onto his hard drive.

  
No, Crowley’s presence is always welcome, especially after the Armageddon’t (an amalgamation coined by the demon and repeated so many times that Aziraphale catches himself using the name without even thinking about it). With Heaven and Hell no longer at their tailcoats, Aziraphale doesn’t have to feel guilty about them spending time together – which may be weird when you’re talking about your best friend of over 6000 years, but Aziraphale would be lying if he said that through all those millennia he never nervously turned around, sure of an angel presence spying on their dinner. Now his life became much more peaceful, but you definitely couldn’t call it boring.  
It all starts with the damned headbands.

  
The angel is enjoying a quiet evening in the bookshop, completely devoid of anything supernatural (except for a particularly rare copy of Arbatel De Magia Veterum on his lap, but that is besides the point). Despite that, he is not too surprised when suddenly someone bangs on the door, urgently like the world was ending again. There is only one person who would knock on the bookshop door as if the plate saying closed was a mere suggestion, worthy only of a salty glance when Aziraphale took too long to respond to the knocking.

  
The angel might be stretching for a few seconds too long and might be taking an unusually long amount of time to walk up to the entrance. Whatever Crowley got himself into again, it can’t be that bad. And Aziraphale doesn’t get a lot of occasions to piss the demon off, so he takes whatever chance fate throws at him.

  
– Don’t think that I don’t know what you’re doing – greets him from the doorstep – I could just teleport in, you know.

  
– After a few centuries, I’m fairly certain you’re too lazy to do that – Aziraphale moves, making space for Crowley to enter – and if I recall correctly, you’ve once nearly discorporated by trapping yourself inside of a brick wall. In broad daylight.

  
– After you’ve promptly distracted me from my temptation. And if I recall correctly you were jealous because Oscar Wilde would rather spend time talking to me than you.

  
A faint blush taints the angel’s face.

  
– There were clear instructions from above to lead him away from his life of sin. I had no personal interests in our relationship, Crowley, and you were interrupting my…

  
– Yeah, yeah, we all believe that – Crowley wiggles his eyebrows suggestingly, stretching himself out on one of the sofas by the fireplace. Something is lying near his feet which wasn’t there before, but before Aziraphale manages to form a question, Crowley is already going off on a completely different topic.

  
He’s gotten much more talkative; since Hell no longer monitores the miracles he makes, the demon is welcome to do whatever he wants to, not obliged anymore to fulfilling boring quotas and tempting politicians (they did an alright job of that on their own, Aziraphale thought). He still somehow glues the occasional penny to the occasional sidewalk, but his favorite field of work is now the Internet. From what Aziraphale understands, he lately loves choosing obscene or confusing images and making them well-known, to the point that Internet users are now starting to speak in a bizarre language of their own, unintelligible rubbish to all who are not keeping up with the trends.

  
Crowley is delighted. Every time he accomplishes something new, he pops by just to stop the angel from what he was currently doing, look directly into Aziraphale’s eyes with his snake pupils and excitedly exclaim:

  
– Angel, they now think that moths are hilarious. In this very moment, there are millions of people who burst with laughter when sent a picture of a moth. You could probably start a political campaign pretending to be a moth and they would vote for you. Humans are great.

  
He seems awfully gleeful every time something like that happens. Sometimes, when they are dining out, Crowley pulls out his phone and sends out a picture into something he calls “the cloud”. Almost every time they can hear someone snickering at the received image. Sometimes people laugh so hard they worry their families and friends, especially those who are not in on the whole thing.

  
– It’s almost like having a cult. Only better, because they expect nothing in return – the demon beams. Aziraphale never understands what is going on in his conquests of the web, but he doesn’t have to. He likes seeing Crowley so genuinely happy and excited by something, a sight he hasn’t witnessed in millennia (wasn’t the last time when he orchestrated the assassination of Julius Caesar? that one left him particularly proud). So the angel just sits and listenes carefully to whatever Crowley has to say, allowing himself to interrupt only when there is something he knows of (which isn’t very often).

  
– Oh, these crazy Japanese comic books, I’ve seen some of them when I went there for food couple years ago – Aziraphale smiles, for once feeling giddy because finally he knows something Crowley blabbers about when he begins a talk about manga, something on Face-book events and running, for some reason? – I also once had to talk a lad out of spending all of his earnings on these… sexual ones. Bit of a nasty task was it. He had a whole bloody apartment littered with these awfully drawn pictures of concerningly young women – the memory surfaces and he winces. Humans really could be awful sometimes.

  
– Oh, you know of these? – Crowley doesn’t seem bothered at all. On the contrary, he begins to smile – Have I ever told you that Hell congratulated me on the creation of hentai? Got a letter in a fancy font and everything. Apparently, it brings in immense amounts of souls every day.

  
Aziraphale feels weak in the knees.

  
– You didn’t actually do that, I presume? – he asks hopefully. Crowley squints at him, with a spark in his eye which makes the angel wish he couldn’t hear what the demon is about to tell him.

  
– Well, technically – Crowley smirks, playfully crossing his arms – I told them I initiated the murder of Archduke Ferdinand, which started the first World War, which lead to the second World War, which lead to the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, which lead to the end of imperialist Japanese ways, which lead to the creation of modern Japanese culture, which birthed hentai into this very world, angel.

  
Aziraphale feels like the world is spinning, even though he’s sure that it’s just Crowley’s impossible ideas giving him a massive headache.

  
– I think you should limit your Internet usage, dear. I’m not sure whether you’re not making any sense, or you’re making too much sense and it’s just too fast for me to understand.

  
The demon smirks again. He points at the mysterious box he previously put by the fireplace.

  
– You should pop some of these in places around the bookshop. Somewhere where lots of people would see them. Would help me out immensely with this secret project, you know. When humans encounter something weird these days, they just google what’s bothering them! Would bring some attention to my event. I got all search engines to display Area51 pages when googling things about Naruto.

  
He rises up from the sofa, clearly about to sprint off before Aziraphale starts asking him questions, but maybe he will manage just one or two if Crowley stays a second longer…

  
– Bye angel, gotta get some people running!

  
And he is off, the bookshop doors don’t even have time to close before he speeds off in the Bentley. Aziraphale waits for the engine sound to die out and carefully lifts the lid of the cardboard box, peeking inside. A bunch of black bands with metal plates screwed onto them are neatly arranged in a pile. The angel doesn’t recognize the spiral symbol carved onto them, which only makes him more worried – are these demonic sigils he’s never encountered before? He shuts the box and shoves it under a desk littered with books and papers. Whatever Crowley is doing, Aziraphale is not going to get involved in it.

  
Oh, how wrong about that he was.

**Author's Note:**

> The book Aziraphale is reading here is a grimoire on how humans and celestial entities can live together peacefully. I thought it was a fun easter egg. The theory on how World War I caused the creation of hentai I remembered from a reddit post and the rest is just my brain going feral. Written for @sassytumbleweed on twitter, you should follow her if you want to read about how postal falcons are superior to the human race.


End file.
